Just Another Day in Metropolis
by nicnac918
Summary: Because a day in the life wouldn't be complete without death traps, kittens in peril, and a supervillain that's far too confusing - or maybe just confused - for his own good.


My entry for the Smallville Big Bang 2012. Many thanks to my lovely betas, fruitbat00 and milkshake42, and to ctbn60 for the gorgeous artwork ( .com(slash) )!

* * *

You definitely aren't nervous, not even the slightest bit. Then again, it's not like you wouldn't have a good excuse to be nervous if you were, which you, of course, are not. At all.

You aren't, as previously stated, nervous, but you are, however, hungry. You glance at the clock on the corner of your computer screen and decide that now would be as good a time as any to go pick up something for lunch. So you save the story you have been idly working on and get up and head down the hall to your fiancée's office.

"Lois," you say, peeking your head into the room. Peeking, because you never know what crazy thing Lois will have spread out across the floor to help with a story. One time, you had walked in without looking first when Lois had what you think was a mosaic recreation, using layers of different colored pieces of paper rather than tiles, of a crime scene that was related to an article she was writing, and you had accidently kicked all the the bottom right corner of the picture out of alignment and left a footprint on a Very Important Document. That night you were forced to eat her cooking for dinner while she chowed down on a double bacon cheeseburger with extra fries from your favorite diner right in front of you. Your fiancée is nothing if not creative.

Today, though, the floor is pristine, or as pristine as the floor of any room regularly inhabited by Lois was going to get anyway, so you go ahead and step the rest of the way in. "I was thinking of running down to that sandwich place, you want anything?"

Lois looks up at you and quirks her eyebrow in that way that always kind of reminds you of Lex. Not that you would ever, ever tell her that; you like your head where it is, thank you very much. "You know, I _am_ capable of picking up lunch too, Clark," she tells you, and you look at her quizzically. It's possible that she and Chloe have worked themselves into another feminist rage over their superhero significant others, but she doesn't sound angry enough for that. "I just think you should lay low for a week or so," she explains. "You know, until Luthor has a chance to get over what happened yesterday."

Yesterday you had discovered a lab where Lex was experimenting on meta-humans – again. So you had broken in and saved them all – again. You were even being careful to cause minimal collateral damage and to make sure that none of the subjects were legitimately dangerous, since two weeks ago Lex had apparently gotten spectacularly drunk and then called you up to complain. It was mostly about "You keep destroying all my expensive equipment," and "Despite what the people of Metropolis think, my insurance does not consider Superman related damage to be an act of God," and "Some of those so-called 'victims' are violent criminals that I'm keeping people safe from." But mingled in there were comments along the lines "You are the worst friend ever," and "I never should have dismantled that room for you," and "You destroyed my car," not to mention a shocking amount of profanity. The rescue mission was going quite well, and you were about to make a point of the fact that you could take a hint when it was drunkenly spelled out for you on your cell phone that had "mysteriously" vanished the next day, when the whole facility blew up. Just a little bit.

Really, you're pretty sure it was Lex's fault. You were being careful, so clearly he just needs to make his labs less explode-able. Still, you doubt he'll see that way. Destroyed labs always make Lex pissy and unreasonable until he has a chance to blow off some steam and restore his supervillain cred by doing something nefarious. Which, incidentally, is why you would be justified in feeling nervous, or, as Lois insinuated this morning, jumpy. Not that you do.

"It's fine; I'll get them." Lois looks skeptical, but you insist. "Lex doesn't scare me. I can handle myself." You haven't died yet after all. Or you have, a couple of times now, but Lex's never killed you, which you think is an important distinction. Besides, it's not like you don't always bounce back anyway.

"If you're sure," Lois says, and then continues on without waiting for the reassurance that she already knows you are going to offer. "I'll take my usual then, thanks."

"Alright," you agree amiably. You leave and hope that "my usual" means "the same thing I got last time."

You walk your normal route to the sandwich shop, trying to remember every order Lois has ever placed so you can figure out which things she ordered the most, and then you have to start all over again when you realize that you should be weighting the totals toward what she's had more recently, since her usual may have changed overtime. It's while you're working on figuring out how, exactly, these types of sandwich statistics would work that you reach your shortcut and stop abruptly.

Your shortcut is an alley that cuts between two large buildings, then turns to go behind two more buildings, then shoots back left to let out right across the street from the deli, cutting a good three blocks off the trip. The alley, much like any alley, is filthy and littered with trash, stinks to high Heaven – and, not for the first time, you wonder why you have super-smelling abilities, as the number of times they have come in handy are far, far out-weighed by the number of times they've made you wish you had no nose – is rarely traversed, and has a tendency of just sliding right past people's focus. In other words, it's the perfect place to get attacked without anyone being any the wiser. Normally this wouldn't bother you, because, even if one discounts the superpowers, you still cut a pretty imposing figure to the average mugger. But then again, your typical definition of normal does not include having blown up one of Lex's labs the day before.

Then again, if you don't take your usual route that might imply that you are scared of Lex, which you most certainly are not. Scared _for_ him sometimes since Lex has an uncanny knack for drawing out people's homicidal urges, but certainly not scared _of_ him.

Mind made up, you start walking down the alleyway, holding your breath and pointedly not trying to figure out if that crumpled furry body is a dead cat or a giant rat. You get about two steps past the first turn when a bright red beam hits you making your knees buckle with the sudden loss of superpowers.

You have a moment reflect that your macho act has really done you no good at all – especially since not going to places where Mercy, or possibly Hope, can shoot you with Lex's red solar radiation ray gun probably falls under the umbrella of sensible precaution, rather than terrified avoidance – before something hard, possibly a baseball bat, hits you in the back of the head.

Your last thought before the world goes black is "At least it wasn't kryptonite."

* * *

You wake up bleary and with what you are certain is _the_ worst headache in the history of _forever_. You think that the bat, or whatever the heck it had been, might have given you a concussion, and you wonder if head injuries always feel like this afterwards. If so, you owe Lex a huge apology, both for all the times you could have saved him from getting hit in the head if you had been a bit faster and less concerned about hiding your powers, and for those times that you actually caused the injury yourself, though you probably should have apologized for the latter regardless. Of course, this is all provided you can find a way to give the apology to him without looking like an idiot, at least, not any more than you usually do.

So, probably not going to happen then.

Even though your head is pounding like your heart has decided to take up residence in your skull, you know exactly where you've woken up, no opening of eyes required – or desired at this point, since you're almost certain that it will only make your headache worse. Right now, you're in Lex's Patented Death Trap: Number 384 – wait no, 385. You almost forgot about the one with the mutant koi fish; that had not been fun. And really that's just more justification for not opening your eyes quite yet. For some reason, one that you're not entirely sure _isn't_ self-sabotage, Lex never takes advantage of any of the obvious opportunities to kill you. Because of that, you can be reasonably certain that whatever Lex has planned this time won't start until he's sure you've returned to consciousness.

But you can't keep your eyes closed forever. So you wait a minute more to see if your headache will go away – it doesn't – and then you open them to investigate your surroundings. You're in a room…. an empty room. The walls are a stark white, as is the ceiling, and the tile flooring, and the florescent lights, and even the door and cameras mounted in the corners of the room. The only thing of any real visual interest is you, sitting in the middle of the room, and the somewhat shabby reporter's suit you're still wearing, which you can only assume is a concession toward your secret identity, since it was technically Clark Kent who was captured, not Superman. Compared to Lex's last attempt to kill you, which involved kryptonite wielding ninjas, this is distinctly disappointing.

Somewhat belatedly – why the heck does your head still hurt any way – you realize that this probably is just a holding room. You'll be taken to the actual Death Trap after Lex comes in and rants at you about his evil plans, and how you're an alien menace, and how he's a much better friend than Oliver Queen. Well, that or he'll ask a bunch of "veiled" questions about Conner. You keep telling him that you'll let him see Conner if he wants to, but Lex seems certain that you and your mother will be better at raising Conner than he would, even if that means, quote, "he's being raised by that insufferable Lane woman as well."

Still, he could have left you a chair or something; sitting on the floor is kind of uncomfortable. You're going to have to have a serious talk with him about his lackadaisical villainy later.

In the meantime, you can try to get out of here before Lex shows up. You don't expect to actually succeed or anything, since you hardly ever escape his death traps until right at the last moment, but it'll at least give you something to stave off the boredom with while you're waiting. People seriously underestimate how dull Death Traps can be – when they're the slow laborious kind, anyway. Well, either that, or you're just seriously jaded in that regard.

You prepare yourself to remove the kryptonite handcuffs that Lex always puts on you, when you realize that you can't actually feel any kryptonite. Your head still hurts like a mother, but other than that you feel completely fine. You look down at your hands and find that, instead of being secured with the usual kryptonite handcuffs, your hands are tied together. With rope.

It's like Lex doesn't even care anymore.

You find that thought exceedingly depressing, possibly the most upsetting thing that has happened to you all month. Of course, _that_ realization in turn triggers the _equally depressing_ realization that you have no life. Fine, as soon as you get out of this, you're going to call up all your buddies and have a guy's night out and prove that Lex isn't the person you're closest to, after your fiancée and Chloe.

Of course, Oliver probably won't be able to make it, since between Justice League duties, Star Industries duties, husband duties, and daddy duties he's busy pretty much full-time nowadays.

And Bruce doesn't believe in having an actual social life, just a carefully construed facsimile of one to fool the public.

And you aren't sure you'll be able to get a hold of Bart since he's in Europe somewhere, his cell phone is lost in South America somewhere, and Chloe won't let you use the Watchtower to contact people for non-Justice League related reasons.

And Victor, against all odds, actually has friends of his own outside the Justice League and mostly only likes to come out with the rest of you when it's for super-heroing type stuff.

And you swore you'd never go out drinking with Emil again after last time. Man, and you had thought the Elvis thing and the sex tape with Tess was bad…

So that just leaves J'onn and AC. And possibly Jimmy 2: The Electric Boogaloo, but you're pretty sure he's not actually old enough to drink yet.

Maybe you'll just destroy another one of Lex's buildings, but this time like you really mean it.

It's at this point that you become conscious of the fact that you are, and have been, idly tugging at your restraints and not only has the rope not snapped apart, it hasn't even frayed a little. A bit mollified by the fact that Lex had at least used some sort of preternaturally strong rope to tie you up, you glare at it, intending to burn it off with your heat vision. Nothing happens. And not a "Lex is using flame retardant rope" nothing happens, a "beams of heat don't shoot out of your eyes" nothing happens. What the heck?

You take a closer look at the rope wrapped around your wrists and notice for the first time the little shots of blue running through it. The rope has blue kryptonite thread in it. Blue. Kryptonite. Thread. How in the heck does Lex afford these things? Never mind, stupid question. But you'd still like to know how he comes up with the ideas for some of them. Because, seriously, blue kryptonite _thread_?

And besides, what was wrong with the regular green kryptonite handcuffs; you liked those handcuffs. Sure, they made your world into an unending sensation of pain, but you had gotten really good at working through the pain and getting them off anyway. Which, come to think of it, is probably why Lex replaced them… Damn.

You're trying to figure out how to get the rope off, you can't exactly "work through" being human the way you can work through pain, when you hear a strange noise and suddenly the room gets a lot brighter and a whole heck of a lot hotter. You look up to see that the outer ring of tiles has dropped away and into what appears to be a pit of lava. Or maybe magma, you forget which one is underground and which is above, besides which you aren't really sure which inside a building counts as. Either way you have to admit that if there is lava/magma involved, then this Death Trap is significantly more impressive than you initially thought. Maybe you won't have to blow up one of Lex's labs after all.

You _are_ going to have to figure out how Lex managed to get his hands on a bunch of lava/magma though. It's not really a cost issue so much as a question of where, exactly, one buys lava and how one transports it. You aren't even trying to consider the potential logistics and it's already making your head hurt. Or maybe that's the combination of the blue kryptonite and the concussion you might have.

The next ring of tiles drops down and maybe you can try to figure this out when you aren't facing impending death by lava/magma.

You stare at the stupid rope balefully. If you just had your powers, this situation wouldn't be a problem: you could just fly above the lava/magma and heat, even the white hot inside of a volcano type of heat, doesn't particularly bother you when you're invulnerable. Plus if you had your powers, you could just tear the rope right off, or burn it with heat vision…

Oh. Well, you're definitely blaming the delay on this one on the headache.

Bracing yourself for some excruciating pain, you walk over to the edge of the overhang. You stay one row of tiles back, just to be safe because it would be just like Lex to vary the intervals at which each row falls down, and stick your hands out straight over the lava/magma. Luckily, there's enough distance between you and the lava/magma that the heat doesn't cook you alive instantly, but your hands _do_ start to blister up in earnest.

On the upside, the rope also starts to blacken around the edges and fray a bit. Now it's just a race against time, a question of whether the rope will burn off first or the last bit of the floor will fall away. You keep yourself as steady as possible, backing up a step whenever the row of tiles in front of you falls away. Your body is basically just a solid blob of pain by the time the rope actually catches on fire and you begin tugging away at it in earnest. You, for perhaps the first time ever, find yourself extremely grateful for the existence of kryptonite, because you think your practice with that form of pain is the only thing keeping you standing right now.

Finally – _finally_ – the rope rips free and falls off, just as the last center tile plummets into the lava/magma. You float in air in a horrible, healing agony for about five seconds and then you feel perfectly fine again. Your skin is all back to normal, your headache is gone, and the heat from the lava/magma, which had been literally _baking you alive_ a second ago, is now a pleasant warmth, similar to what you expect most people feel when they lay out in the sun on a hot day.

Your reporter suit is a complete loss though. It's just lucky that your Superman suit is made of a bit sterner stuff than the average piece of clothing, because you had to fly naked before and it's really not an experience you want to repeat, ever. Still, despite the fact that you aren't faced with the prospect of flying around as naked as the day you were born, or the day you landed on Earth, or the day you met the love of your life, or… why the hell are you naked so often – it's with a mournful air that you strip off the remnants of your jacket and pants and throw them into the lava/magma to dispose of them. You really liked that suit. You do at least, feel a little vindictive glee in throwing your tie into the inferno because it is, in fact, the tie that Lex gave you for your eighteenth birthday, back when the two of you were still sort of friends, citing that every man needs a nice tie. You've been meaning to get rid of it for a while now but… it's a really nice tie. Or at least it _was_ a really nice tie. Now it's a pile of ash and you'll never have to see Lex's smug smirk when you wear it ever again. Ha!

It's possible you're being just a bit petty.

Once you finish divesting yourself of your clothes, you kick start the X-ray vision and look around for an exit. The door on the wall directly in front of you leads to a hallway, and from there, to another room. There are a couple of people in there, probably working for LexCorp, though only _potentially_ dangerous.

On the other hand, the wall to your left has only about ten feet of solid rock between you and sweet freedom, and Lex is usually willing to be magnanimous about property destruction when it happens while you're escaping from a Death Trap. Through the wall it is then.

You hit open air and turn around to inspect the facility you were being held in, which turns out to be a volcano. That would explain where Lex got the lava/magma then. You shoot up a bit higher in the sky for further inspection, which reveals that the volcano in question is the one on the Big Island in Hawaii – topography and geography have become areas of expertise for you ever since you started flying all over the place. From the height of the sun it's sometime early to mid-morning here, which means it's early to mid-afternoon in Metropolis (You've also memorized the exact location of all the various time zones around the world and how they relate to Metropolis). And since that's about what time it was when you were originally kidnapped, and there had to be some travel time involved, you've been out of it for about a day.

Why can't Lex ever stage these stupid things on days when you don't have work?

Huffing a sigh of annoyance, you orient yourself toward Kansas and speed back to Metropolis.

* * *

Your plan once you get back to Metropolis is fairly simple one: go home, get clean, get dressed in reporter clothes, go to The Daily Planet, talk to Perry, catch up on work. Simple, straight forward, and ultimately doomed to failure. You're just barley back within earshot, for certain definitions of 'within earshot,' of Metropolis when you hear the distinct sounds of a train derailment. Putting on an extra burst speed, you get to the train as things are just starting to head south, and, with a judicious use of strength and speed, you manage to avert said southward journey.

You land on the ground and stand there for a minute, waiting to make sure everything is stable and there's no one trapped somehow or in need of superfast hospital transportation. While you're waiting, you hear the click of a camera behind you and a familiar voice calls out, "Hey, Superman!"

You turn, and, sure enough, it's Jimmy 2: Return from Witch Mountain. He just "happens to be" at the sites of so many of the disasters that you avert that you would suspect him of stalking you if you weren't all but certain that was physically impossible. Well, physically impossible for Jimmy 2: Fievel Goes West. Lex, on the other hand, definitely has the money necessary to stalk you and you're pretty sure he does, even if you can't prove it exactly.

"Hey Jimmy," you say, booming a little because it's kind of hard not to boom when you're wearing the Kryptonian equivalent of bright blue and red spandex.

It's always secretly freaked you out somewhat the way Jimmy 2: and the Chamber of Secrets looks _just_ like Jimmy: and the Philosopher's Stone did at his age. Exactly the same; you've brought in as many pictures of Jimmy: The Phantom Menace as you can get your hands on and have yet to find a single difference between the two of them. Of course you were even more freaked out when you were flipping through an old high school yearbook and noticed that Jimmy Squared looked just like Eric Summers, that kid who stole your powers that one time. You have yet to find proof that this is anything more than a coincidence, but you're still looking.

"Mind if I get a picture of you and the train for the Planet?" Jimmy 2: Attack of the Clones asks.

You want to say: yes, you do mind, and anytime people want to stop taking pictures of you would be great. But that would be rude, and your mom always taught you to be polite to other people. You had thought that her taking up the job of the shadowy leader of Washington D.C.'s underground, a job that involves a disturbing amount of theft, lies, and threatening to kill or otherwise bodily injure people – not that your mother actually follows through on these threats and Lex and Lois and their insinuations that you're in denial can just go… elsewhere, thank you very much – would have softened her up with regards to the whole rudeness thing, but you were wrong. Really, the only effect it's had is to add that extra layer of terrifying to her lectures on the subject. So you just say, "Go right ahead."

"Thanks," Jimmy 2: 2 Fast 2 Furious says grinning. He holds up his camera and you adopt the standard Superman pose: feet shoulder width apart (well, not _your_ shoulders, because _your_ shoulders are ridiculously broad), arms crossed, and a big smile. Lois assures you that this makes you look heroic and self-confident, but you always kind of feel like you look smug and conceited. So when Jimmy 2: Red White & Blonde drops his camera, you gratefully drop the pose as well.

"Hey you wouldn't have happened to have seen Clark around lately, have you?" he asks with a hopeful look.

You resist the urge to ask him if his brother was the one to get all the brains in the family, because that would be rude AND insensitive, no matter how true you suspect it of being. After all, Jimmy: The Original Series figured out you were The Blur twice, both times with significantly less information than Jimmy 2: The Next Generation has, given that you're standing right in front of him in full uniform, and yet Jimmy 2: High Voltage is still completely clueless.

"No," you respond instead, and it's not exactly a lie. You can hardly see _yourself_ around. Especially since you haven't encountered any mirrors since "Clark" went missing.

"Oh," says Jimmy 2: Chain of Memories, deflating a bit. "Well, could you keep an eye open? No one has seen him since he went to get lunch yesterday and I think Lois is really worried."

Crap, you forgot about Lois. Okay, go home, get clean, get dressed in normal clothes, go to the Planet, _talk to Lois_, and then talk to Perry and catch up on work. "I'll keep a watch out," you promise Jimmy 2: The Two Towers, before flying off.

You're about halfway back to your apartment when you hear someone call out for Superman and you can't not go, even if you are covered in volcanic ash and… train dust.

You land directly in front of the person seeking your attention and are confronted with a little girl, about six or seven you think, who looks like just like you imagine Chloe looked at that age. She even has that kind of hair flippy thing going on like Chloe used to in high school. She's also crying.

"What's wrong?" you ask her, making a conscious effort to modulate the boom. She's already upset and you don't want to scare her.

"It's my kitty," she says sniffing a little and pointing.

You follow the direction of her finger to see a little orange tabby kitten stuck in a tree. It takes you a moment to process what you're seeing because really, your life isn't this cliché is it? Shouldn't you have gotten some advanced notice or a memo or something first? It's not even a job for Superman particularly; the kitten is only about six or so feet off the ground, so really it's just a job for a moderately tall person.

But the little girl is looking at you with these huge wet eyes and her little sniffle-y nose and she looks just like a mini-Chloe and you're just really bad at saying no, so you go ahead and reach up and grab her kitten. Luckily the little guy, or girl maybe – you never quite got the hang of telling which gender a cat is – doesn't get upset and try to scratch or bite you. Not that it would have bothered you any, but there's a good chance the kitten might have hurt itself. And if you're going to do something as embarrassing as saving a kitten from a tree in full Superman uniform, then at least you're going to do a good job of it.

She beams up at you, her cheeks dimpling as she grins, and it's totally worth it, even if you do feel like a moron. You just hope no one you know ever finds out about this _ever_, because you'll never hear the end of it if they do. "Thank you, Superman."

"You're welcome," you say, ruffling her hair a bit before you take off again.

This time you actually make it back to the apartment, and you hop into the shower gratefully. Unfortunately, ash and volcano smell doesn't wash off as easily as you might have hoped, and you end up spending twice as long in the shower as you meant to and still only come out half as clean as you'd like to be. But Perry's bound to be testy about your extended absence already, so there isn't any point in making it worse on yourself.

So, of course, when you get out of the shower there's a message waiting for you from the Fortress. You groan, because _seriously_? You _just_ got out of the shower and you've already missed more than a full day of work. But when you actually listen to the voicemail it turns out it's just Jor-El calling to check in to see how the whole "rule them with strength" plan is coming along. You had thought when he started talking about being a hero and what-not it meant he had moved on from the whole being an Alien Overlord thing, but it turns out you were wrong. What actually happened was, at some point amidst the various shut-downs and reboots and modifications and jumps from different physical structures, Jor-El gained the ability to spy on different dimensions. And, whilst he was doing his interdimensional channel surfing, he came across a world where an alternate version of you had become a superhero and de facto leader of a group called the Justice Lords that ruled Earth with an iron fist. Since at the time Jor-El discovered this, you had your superhero identity The Blur, and your group of superhero friends, the precursors to the Justice League, Jor-El just assumed that your plan was the same as the alternate Clark's. You have yet to disabuse him of this notion.

You send the megalomaniac AI of your dead biological father a quick email to assure him that all is going as planned – which it is, even if his idea of what the plan is, is a bit off. Then you throw on a suit that you don't like nearly as much and a tie that isn't nearly as nice as the ones you lost in the fire – stupid Lex – and you run off to work.

* * *

There are times when you resent that Perry knows your secret – usually the times when you're upset about the fact that you lied to all your friends for years, but now apparently anyone smart enough to put two and two together gets a full disclosure. And not even full disclosure from you, but from your Mom, who, despite the fact you are a grown man, is apparently allowed to make blanket decisions about your life without consulting you, like telling her boyfriend and your boss all about your secret identity. But now is not one of those times; now is one of the times where you're fanatically grateful that your boss knows your secret. Because now, instead of making up a story about coming down with a sudden and horrible stomach virus and only just being able to rush yourself to the hospital before you passed out, but not in time to tell anyone where you were and you didn't have your wallet on you so they didn't know who you or your emergency contact was, you can just tell Perry the truth, that Lex kidnapped you, again, and tried to kill you, again.

You finish up your explanation, touching on your stop to help with the train derailment and the shower, but glossing over the part with the kitten, and look at Perry. He gives you a long look before saying, "No."

"No?" you echo, confused.

"No," Perry affirms, declining to clarify.

"What do you mean no… Chief?" you say. You always tack on the "chief" when it looks like he might be getting upset. Perry likes it when you do that – you think it's a hold-over from that time period when Perry was an alcoholic and didn't get any respect at all – and it does seem to mollify him a bit.

"Look, Kent," Perry says, looking you in the eye, "I understand that you have other responsibilities – important responsibilities – that sometimes supersede your responsibilities here at the Planet. I'm not always happy about it, but I understand it and I think I'm doing a pretty good job about cutting you some slack when you have to go take care of other things while on the job."

"You're great Chief," you assure him. You aren't above doing a little brown-nosing when you have to.

He gives you a look, but you aren't worried. You're proven right not to when, after a second he continues sounding not quite as fed up with you. "Usually it's not too hard to go easy on you; your stunts have a way of drawing attention so at least I know exactly where you've been. And you're a good kid Clark, so even when you don't make the press with some exploit or other, I can usually trust you're telling me the truth about what you've been up to. But this is just taking things too far. This must be the two hundredth time you've missed work because Luthor threw you into a death trap." Actually it was the three hundred and ninth, but one hundred and three of those times you had been gone for so short a period, or right at the end or beginning of the day, that no one had really had noticed you were gone, so, given that you hadn't told anyone about those other one hundred and three times, his guess was uncannily accurate. Well, you hadn't told anyone but Lois, who, crap, you've forgotten about again. You make a quick mental note to go find her after you're done talking to Perry and tune back into the conversation.

"I won't fault you for missing work because you were kidnapped, but at this point I'm going to need some proof that that's what happened before I let you off the hook."

"Proof?" you stutter. "He tried to drop me into a volcano, any evidence there might have been got burned to ash." The room you had been trapped in must be destroyed by now, and though you're certain that Lex had been watching you while you were in the Death Trap, you're equally certain that he didn't make any recordings of it. Not that he wouldn't enjoy watching get cooked to a crisp whenever he wanted, but he wouldn't want to risk anyone else finding the tape and possibly learning your secret. Lex jealously guards your secret like it belongs to him – in fact it's entirely possible he genuinely thinks it does – and resents anyone knowing except for him and, if he's feeling particularly gracious, you.

"It doesn't have to be physical evidence," Perry assures you. "If you can get a witness to collaborate your story, that's good enough."

A witness? What witness? There are no witnesses; you were in a room, alone, above a volcano. The only person that you know knows for a fact what happened is–

Crap. Sometimes you really, really hate your life.

* * *

You suspect that Lex's secretary, Charity, knows that you're Superman. You're sure that Lex wouldn't have told her, but you are fairly certain that she, as well as Mercy and Hope, have somehow managed to figure it out anyway. This is partially because the evil knowing gleam she gets in her eyes whenever she sees Clark Kent or Superman, and only those two people, not even that one guy who held a gun to Lex's forehead got quite as an intense evil look as you get in your various personas, and partially because, when you told her you needed to talk to Lex, she asked if she should, "Tell Mr. Luthor that Clark Kent is here to see him or Superman?" Okay, so mostly it was the second thing, but you still don't trust that look in her eyes.

"Do I look like Superman to you?" you ask her, having found in the past that people are more likely to believe you if you casually dismiss their suspicious rather than vehemently deny them. Apparently people think vehement denial is suspicious or something.

She doesn't answer, just gives you a look that manages to be both supremely disinterested and, despite the fact that she's about five foot two inches tall, probably weighs less than a hundred pounds, has hair that cascades in strawberry ringlets reminiscent of Shirley Temple, and absolutely no superpowers to speak of (to your knowledge), a bit terrifying.

"Clark Kent," you tell her with a bit of a sigh, resigning yourself to the fact that, yeah, she definitely knows.

She nods and picks up the phone, saying a couple of words to Lex before hanging it up again. "Mr. Luthor will be with you in a few minutes. If you could just wait over there," she says with a smile that reminds you that Charity is capable of killing a person in less than five seconds and with just her thumbs. One or the other that is, not both at the same time. You suspect Hope is capable of doing them both simultaneously though, and you know Mercy is because you saw her do it once. The guy she did it to was that same one holding the gun to Lex's head and trying to kill him at the time, so you didn't get on her case about it or anything, but it was still one of the scariest and most traumatic things you've ever seen. Scarier, even, than the time Brainiac teamed up with Doomsday, though not as traumatic as the time when you were eight and didn't knock on your parent's bedroom door before walking in. THAT was the most horrifying experience of your life.

You shuffle over to where Charity pointed and end up having to stand there awkwardly because, once again, there is no chair. You're starting to wonder if Lex has some heretofore unknown to you aversion to chairs, or if this is all a plot to keep you from being comfortable. Admittedly the former sounds a little far-fetched, even keeping in mind some of the really weird stuff Lex does, but the latter isn't even remotely out of the realm of possibility.

You're looking around the room as you wait and you notice that Charity has started to do… something (having lived with at least one female in the house for almost the entirety of your life has done surprisingly little to illuminate their grooming habits to you) with her nails. It's not particularly professional behavior, and since Lex's people are professional to a fault, whether they're helping Lex with a hostile takeover or helping Lex to shoot you out of the sky with kryptonite lasers – number 13, though Lex still keeps the lasers around for general use against you even after they proved ineffective as a Death Trap – so you can only assume she's doing it on purpose. You look at what she's doing a little more closely and realize that her nails are painted a bright and sparkly green, exactly the same color as kryptonite. You aren't entirely sure Lex would let her wear actual kryptonite nail polish, what with the risk of mutation, but then again you're not entirely sure he wouldn't let her wear it either. And even if it is just a mind trick to screw with your head, it's totally working because Charity is about twenty percent scarier right now.

After a few minutes of you standing around looking like an idiot and watching Charity's hands, her phone rings. She picks it up and has another brief conversation with Lex, and then she waves you on to his office.

Unsurprisingly, Mercy and Hope are flanking the doors when you walk up and they, as always, look a combination of completely relaxed and as though they could decapitate you in less than a second if you looked at them funny. You know that normally at least one of them stays inside the office at all times – the room theoretically only has the one entrance, however Lex has a surprisingly large number of people who come after him that can walk through walls or fly or just jump really high – but he always kicks them out when you as Clark Kent stop by. It's on the whole preferable to how he has them behave when you a Superman stop by, having them break-out the kryptonite lasers, which is why you have stopped coming by to lecture him in uniform.

As you pass the two bodyguards, you crane your neck a little to try to see if their nails are painted too. Hope, at least, catches you looking and flashes you a smirk and a glimpse of completely clean nails. You fail to find this as reassuring as you thought you would, probably because Hope's smug air makes it very clear that the reason their nails aren't painted is because they don't need it.

For a brief moment you miss the days when Lex's security was awful at their jobs and didn't intimidate you in the slightest. But it's only briefly because between Lex's actually effective security and Lana's superpowers, you have a lot more free time than you used to.

You throw open the doors, both at the same time. A little melodramatic maybe, but it's also a lot of fun. Of course both the melodrama and the fun are ruined a bit by needing to turn around and close the doors, but it was definitely worth it.

Lex is sitting at his desk in a leather monstrosity of a chair, which is, in fact, the only piece of furniture designed for sitting in the entire room. This is so totally a conspiracy against you and you're starting to seriously wonder if, were you to fiddle with your vision so you could see, the chair at your desk at the Planet would be gone too.

"Clark Kent," Lex says and he looks at you like he wants to eat you. You've never been able to quite figure out if that's in a literal, pseudo-cannibalistic, kryptonite tipped knives and forks kind of way or in the… other kind of way, and frankly you don't really want to know. "What can I do for you?"

There's a hint of resentment in his tone, but you're fairly certain that only comes from being treated like, as he puts it, "a favor dispenser." And, to be fair, the only times you come to see him are when you have reporter business or Superman business, or you when really need something that you think that you think Lex might be willing to help you with, but you guys are arch-enemies now. Just stopping by for a game of pool would be weird. Even if that pool table he set up in his office really is supposed to be a hint.

The good news, though, is that he seems like he's gotten over the building you blew up the other day. You would have never suspected it before, but it turns out Lex's amazing ability to hold grudges until the end of forever has one weakness. If Lex just gets a chance to attempt to kill the person he's angry at, then, regardless of whether the attempt is successful or not, he's willing to let bygones be bygones. You'd probably be more worried about this particular coping skill of his, but to your knowledge he only ever uses it on you – oh, and on Helen that one time, but that was kind of a special circumstance – and you'd rather he'd dish it out at you, who can take it, than take out his anger on innocent bystanders.

"Hey Lex," you say, and then, because as much as you'd like to beat around the bush with this, you can't think of an indirect way of phrasing it – indirectness has never been your strong suit – you blurt out all at once, "Can you write something to Perry to let him know that you really did capture me and put me in a Death Trap, because he doesn't believe me?"

Lex smirks at you. "Aren't you a little old to be needing a doctor's note to get out of school?" Because no confrontation with Lex would be complete without him making you feel like you're still in elementary school at some point.

"Can you just write it please?" you whine and then pout a little bit. It's a calculated risk on your part because half the time when you, or at least you as Clark, you aren't stupid enough to try this while you're in reporter mode and Superman doesn't pout, period, try this, Lex just caves and the other half of the time he catches onto you and your manipulative pout and gets more obstinate on general principle.

"I would but I'm afraid I don't know what you're talking about," he replies, sounding faintly pissed.

Damn.

"C'mon Lex," you say. "We both know you did it. Plus, I think you lose the right to plausible deniability about your Death Traps when you start patenting them."

"Those aren't Death Traps," he sniffs. "Those are security measures set in place in case Superman ever goes rogue, either independently, or due to magic control, mind control, brainwashing, or because he's been replaced by a duplicate by an alternate dimension."

All valid concerns, and also the reason that Chloe, Bruce, and your mom all have a bit of kryptonite squirreled away in a lead-lined (to protect you from the radiation and to protect others from potentially mutating) safe in the Watchtower, a state of the art lead-lined safe in the Batcave, and a lead-lined flour jar in her pantry, respectively. You tried to convince Lois to hide a piece too, but she had declined. The two of you did come up with a number of different contingency plans, though.

So, really, Lex's argument was a fairly good one, assuming one didn't know that Lex hadn't bothered to wait for you to go rogue to test them out. But, even without that knowledge, there was still one major flaw in his logic. "Do you really need 385 different contingency measures?"

"One can never be too prepared."

"Uh-huh," you say skeptically. "Go on, pull the other one."

Now he looks really mad. "Are you accusing me of lying? Because that's rich coming from you, Clark." Of all the things you've ever done to make him angry – and regardless of how justified you think he is in that anger you can't deny that that's a heck of a lot of things – it's the lying to him about your alien heritage because you feared for your life if anyone ever found out that he can't seem to let go. Not even with a little attempted homi– uh, alienicide to let off steam. You'll be waiting for the sky to literally fall before he moves on from that.

"Please, Lex?" you say softly peering up at him with big eyes from beneath your bangs. You don't pout though, because you already tried that once this conversation and it was a total bust. "It's my job on the line here."

Not that you need the job, exactly. Honestly, it would be much easier to just buy a bunch of coal, squash it all into diamonds, and sell them for a huge profit margin. Then you could become independently wealthy and just save people on the side. Of course, your mom might take issue with your lack of work ethic, not to mention then you'd just be ripping off of Oliver who's already ripping off of Bruce, though Oliver denies it, and being a poor man's version of a poor man's version doesn't particularly appeal to you. Plus you like working with Lois.

Crap, you forgot Lois, _again_. Okay, seriously, _right after this_ you're going to go find Lois and let her know that you're okay and Lex's Death Trap has once again failed.

Lex looks at you and your puppy dog expression and you think you see his eyes soften just a little teensy bit. Score.

"How's your family?" Lex asks, and from anyone else that would be a complete non sequitur, and you aren't necessarily certain that it isn't one here too, but there's at least an equally good chance that Lex is trying to bargain with you, information on Conner for the confirmation from him that you need for Perry.

"You know, if you'd just let me talk to Conner…" Lex glares at you and you can only assume that your continued efforts to make this whole thing simpler for him are making him angry. You sigh and answer his question, sans embellishments this time. "Mom's doing fine, and Conner's great. He just got a report card back; he got a B in PE, which he claims is because he was overcompensating for his powers and the teacher thought he was being lazy, but it's possible he was just actually being lazy. But he got A's on everything else, so we didn't really get on his case about it. He's also really getting good at flying. I think it helps that he's never been afraid of heights like I used to be." This last bit you say with a small sheepish smile, because, in retrospect, you have to admit that being afraid of heights when you're invulnerable is kind of ridiculous.

Lex listens to this information with a faintly smug expression. While you're sure that his continued concern for Conner's welfare comes from a legitimate paternal affection, you suspect that some of his pride in Conner's accomplishments comes from Lex's deep-seated desire to show up Lionel. And really, wanting to show up one's father by having a better adjusted child than he ever did isn't the _best_ reason to want to be a good parent, but you learned a long time ago that, so long as his ends and means are in the light grey to white range, not to question Lex's reasons for... pretty much anything really.

Lex basks for a while in the glow of being, if not less evil than his father because of the death rays alone, then less of a dick at least, until he realizes a minute or so later that you're still standing there waiting. "I'm still not going to write anything to Perry for you."

Dick. Apparently it had been a complete non sequitur after all.

"Do you really think I'm stupid enough to actually confess to trying to kill Superman on paper and the give that confession to the editor of a major newspaper?"

And that... was a fair point, actually. Fine, you can compromise. "Can't you just write something vaguely worded enough that Perry knows that I'm not lying without actually being incriminating?" Lex still looks skeptical, so you add, "You can even put my secret identity in it so you know we won't show it to anybody else, and that anyone who does happen to see it will think it's a joke."

"I suppose I could write Perry a quick e-mail," Lex says, infinitely long-suffering.

"Thanks," you say with a smile. Just because you're arch-nemeses, that's no excuse for being rude. At least, not according to your mom it isn't.

"Anything for a friend," Lex says, without a hint of irony. Because apparently, and this much you've gathered from his rants of both the sober and the completely smashed variety, Lex still thinks of the two of you as friends. You aren't sure how he reconciles that with all the attempts he makes on your life, but there it is.

Although, come to think of it, Lex _was_ raised by Lionel, and _does_ believe that everything he needs to know about friendship he learned in Smallville, so it's possible that he genuinely thinks that Death Traps are standard part and parcel of the friendship package. In fact, the more you consider that theory, the more you like it, if for no other reason than it makes you feel a lot less guilty than Chloe's theory that all the head injuries Lex has sustained have led to permanent brain damage that makes it difficult for Lex to make moral, rational decisions.

"Just so you know," Lex says as he's typing away at his keyboard, "I'm only going to cover for you for the time that I was actually holding you in custody. If you took the scenic route back, that's your problem."

You shrug, in no way surprised by Lex's insinuations that he already knows about the train derailment thing that happened less than an hour ago. He probably knows you went home and took a shower too, though you don't think he could possibly know about the kitten thing. "I already told Perry about needing to get new clothes before I came back to work, and Jimmy was at the train derailment, so he can back me up on that one."

Lex levels a serious look at you. "Clark, are you sure that Jimmy 2: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe isn't stalking you?"

Strange minds think alike apparently. Although the thought that you and Lex think alike is so terrifying that you repress it immediately. Also… "Was that even a sequel?"

"While _The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe_ was the first of the Narnia books that C. S. Lewis wrote, chronologically it comes second, after _The Magician's Nephew_," Lex informs you.

"Oh. And no, I don't think he's stalking me. He lacks the superpowers and/or economic power to do so."

"He could be deliberately causing all these disasters to get your attention," Lex suggests.

"Isn't that your job?" you snark back.

Lex scowls at you, and then turns back to his computer screen muttering something about "Bruce Willis" and "Samuel L. Jackson" and "big dumb aliens that don't get my references." You cheerfully ignore him, declining to mention that you have seen _Unbreakable_ and you think that Lex is a better match for the Elijah Price character anyway.

Then Lex's lips twitch in concealed amusement and you're sure you aren't going to like what comes next. "Did you tell Perry about the kitten you saved too?"

Crap. How could Lex have possibly found out about the kitten thing? It's not like he had cameras set up all over Metropolis or anything... Strike that, that's probably exactly what it's like. Man you're never going to live this down.

"I know you've been called a boy scout before Clark, but don't you think you're taking it a little too far?" Lex continues, far too smug and amused for your own good.

"Shut up," you growl and Lex smirks.

After another minute of silence, during which you were most definitely not sulking, Lex makes a dramatic click of the mouse and looks up at you. "There, e-mail sent." _Now get out._

"Thank you," you say again, because if you're going to treat him like a favor dispenser then at least you're going to be properly grateful for it. You like to think you've matured a little since high school.

"Anytime," Lex assures you with a sharp-toothed smile. That comment, coming from absolutely anyone else in the entire world, would mean something along the lines of "if you are ever in need of a favor, please don't hesitate to ask, and I'll help in any way I possibly can." But this is Lex, so what it actually means is probably something closer to, "I'd be willing to write another e-mail for you the next time one of my Death Traps causes you to miss a significant amount of work too."

Deciding that fleeing is the better part of valor here, you head to the door before Lex can break out Number 386 and make good on that promise. Just as you're about to leave though, you remember something from earlier, and since you really don't think you can look any stupider than you do now, you decide, what the heck. "Hey, Lex, I am really sorry about all those time you got hit on the head back in Smallville."

Lex looks at you completely blank, but not his usual poker face blank. Nope, this is a stunned shocked blank. "Apology accepted," he finally manages. You grin at him then, one of the smiles that Chloe had, on one occasion, claimed to have literally blinded her with its brightness. More stunned shock from Lex, and you get out of there before you can break out in triumphant laughter. You so totally won this round. Clark Kent one, Lex Luthor…

Well maybe you won't keep score. You won this round, and that's what's important.

* * *

When you get back to the Planet the first thing you do is stop by Perry's office. Once you're sure that your absence has been excused, you head back to your desk. You're resolving to steal Jimmy 2: Revenge of the Fallen's chair if your own has gone "mysteriously missing," the same way your cell phone with the drunken message from Lex, your thumb drive loaded with family pictures of you, your mom, Lois, and Conner, your collection of files on LexCorp's less savory dealings, and your favorite pillow for some reason that can't possibly be good had, when someone grabs your arm.

"Whoa there, tiger," Lois says, and crap you forgot about Lois again. "Are you okay? Where have you been?" You can see the lingering worry in her eyes, and you are the worst fiancée ever.

"I'm fine, Lois. I just got a bit caught up in that thing you were concerned about," you say, mindful of the fact anyone could walk by and overhear you. "But I took care of it and it's good now." You'll tell her more about what happened later in private.

She still looks a bit doubtful, so you lean in and give her a "I'm sorry I worried you by getting kidnapped and further compounded that worry by not letting you know as soon as I got away" kiss. Later, you'll probably wonder what it says about your lives that this particular kiss is a regular part of both your repertoires, but for now you're just going to enjoy spontaneously making out with your fiancée in the middle of your workplace. Of all the people you've kissed, Lois is by far the best at it, and the fact that the number of people you've kissed barely cracks the double digits – less if you don't count the times you weren't in your right mind – should in no way lessen the impact of that statement.

Of course, the two of you are still in the middle of the hallway, and eventually someone walking by wolf whistles at the pair of you. You pull back, flushing red with embarrassment, and Lois smiles up at you, looking supremely satisfied with herself.

"You're sure you're okay?" she asks, because the two of you have a policy of double checking on the other's wellbeing after a near death experience.

"I'm sure. Everything is fine," you tell her. "Really. It was just another day in Metropolis."


End file.
